one had credited with heroic qualities
revealed them. Others failed rather pitiably to live up to one's
expectations. It seemed to me that there was strength or weakness in men,
quite apart from their real selves, for which they were in no way
responsible; but doubtless it had always been there, waiting to be called
forth at just such crucial times.

During the afternoon I heard for the first time the hysterical cry of a
man whose nerve had given way. He picked up an arm and threw it far out
in front of the trenches, shouting as he did so in a way that made one's
blood run cold. Then he sat down and started crying and moaning. He was
taken back to the rear, one of the saddest of casualties in a war of
inconceivable horrors. I heard of many instances of nervous breakdown,
but I witnessed surprisingly few of them. Men were often badly shaken and
trembled from head to foot. Usually they pulled themselves together under
the taunts of their less susceptible comrades.

III. RISSOLES AND A REQUIEM

At the close of a gloomy October day, six unshaven, mud-encrusted machine
gunners, the surviving members of two teams, were gathered at the C
Company gun emplacement. D Company's gun had been destroyed by a shell,
and so we had joined forces here in front of the wrecked dugout, and were
waiting for night when we could bury our dead comrades. A fine drenching
rain was falling. We sat with our waterproof sheets thrown over our
shoulders and our knees drawn up to our chins, that we might conserve the
damp warmth of our bodies. No one spoke. No reference was made to our
dead comrades who were lying there so close that we could almost touch
them from where we sat. Nevertheless, I believe that we were all thinking
of them, however unwillingly. I tried to see them as they were only a few
hours before. I tried to remember the sound of their voices, how they had
laughed; but I could think only of the appearance of their mutilated
bodies.

On a dreary autumn evening one's thoughts often take a melancholy turn,
even though one is indoors, sitting before a pleasant fire, and hearing
but faintly the sighing of the wind and the sound of the rain beating
against the window. It is hardly to be wondered at that soldiers in
trenches become discouraged at times, and on this occasion, when an
unquenchably cheerful voice shouted over an adjoining traverse,--

"Wot che'r, lads! Are we downhearted?"--a growling chorus answered with
an unmistakable